The Gal Next to Me Is Trying Too Hard to Make Me Fall in Love With Her
“Amagi-san?”
“…………”
“Hey, Amagi-saaan?”
“…………”
“……Huh?”
Subaru cut her meal short and left, saying, “I gotta go draw manga.” Seemed like Amagi-san had somehow spurred her on.
After that, I delivered fish to my part-time job and stayed up watching TV with Amagi-san, who wanted to jump at the moment of New Year’s. But with ten minutes left until the new year, she fell asleep.
Her lower body was swallowed by the kotatsu, her upper body sprawled out on the floor.
I hesitated a little about whether I should wake her up forcefully, then decided against it.
I could see her getting angry later, yelling, “Why didn’t you wake me up!?” But still…
“Fuuu… Sae-ki… mmmph…”
Whatever dream she was having, her sleeping face looked so incredibly happy. I just couldn’t bring myself to wake her up.
Thinking back, this might actually be the first time I’ve properly seen Amagi-san’s sleeping face.
When she stayed over to help with the cultural festival prep, I felt bad seeing a woman so vulnerable and tried hard not to look.
The last time she fell asleep at my place, we’d been talking late into the night, and it ended up being me who passed out first—what a fool I was.
…Even now, this is a pretty intense situation, huh.
A girl sleeping without a shred of caution in a single guy’s apartment. She trusts me completely. The fact that someone who isn’t family or anything allows me this much into her world makes me unbearably happy.
“So cute…”
I murmured, wanting to see her face more clearly, and gently brushed the hair from her eyelids with my finger.
Long lashes covering her beautiful eyes. A perfectly shaped nose bridge. Lustrous cherry-pink lips.
Knowing it was wrong, I lightly stroked her cheek with my fingertips.
Porcelain skin.
A texture that perfectly suited every onomatopoeia—smooth, silky, soft, supple—to the absolute extreme.
Just seeing her, touching her like this, made the sun shine inside my chest.
It warmed me, made me happy, and my heart sweated with refreshing joy.
“Mmm… fufuu…”
“…!”
She stirred, rubbing her cheek against my hand. Her moist lips parted, her body moved again, and she gently kissed my palm.
As if clinging, as if begging, as if needing nothing else.
I felt heat and moisture near the base of my middle finger. That unique sensation triggered a memory, and the scene from the sauna raced through my mind.
She kissed my forehead, my cheek, my ear, and I kissed her back, peering inside her bath towel.
We nearly died together, and somehow it all got muddled… but man, we did something crazy, didn’t we?
She was beautiful.
Like God had woven petals into threads, she was truly beautiful.
At the same time, my adolescence, my male instincts, flared up like memories burning on kindling. I didn’t want to look at her that way, but my gaze inevitably drifted to her body.
Beneath that dress.
Beyond one layer of fabric, then another.
My hand slipped from her cheek, tracing her collarbone with my fingers. Over her shoulder to her elbow, down her arm to her stomach, moving slightly higher—then I smacked my own cheek.
No. That’s not okay, I…!
When Amagi-san was flirting with me, maybe it was understandable to think such things.
But this wasn’t that. She trusted me enough to fall asleep… Wait, touching her like this is despicable! There’s no excuse for this—it’s pure inappropriate behavior!
“…………Hm?”
She tilted her head.
For a moment, I thought our eyes met.
“Um…”
“Sshh… sshh…”
“Are you… awake…?”
“Sshh… sshh…”
Her eyelids were firmly shut. Her breathing was peaceful.
Frowning, wondering what that had been about, I suddenly remembered a line.
“Amagi-san, the new year has already started.”
“Seriously!? Wh-why didn’t you wake me up!?”
A lightning-fast awakening.
She checked the time on her phone and, realizing there were still three minutes left until the new year, glanced at me before awkwardly looking away.
“You weren’t… pretending to be asleep, were you…?”
“I-I really was asleep at first! But then Saeki touched my cheek… Huh? Is this the kind of thing where I get attacked!? I thought, so I figured, well, maybe it’s okay…!”
“That’s not ‘I guess it’s fine’!”
She laughed, scratching the back of her head, her face instantly turning mischievous.
“More importantly… why did you touch my cheek?”
“Huh?”
“You touched my body too, right? With those lewd hands, all sticky…”
“…S-sorry. It was… an impulse, I guess…”
“You were lusting after me♡ You’re such a bad boy, Saeki♡”
On this point, there was no room for excuses or arguments. I apologized again, bowing my head. Amagi-san ruffled my hair and purred happily.
“Don’t worry about it♡ Want to do something naughty right now?”
“N-No way!”
“Don’t be shy ♡ Hey, wanna touch my boobs? They’re all yours, Saeki!”
“Hey, don’t pull my hand—Wait, time! T-The new year’s gonna start!”
“Whoa!! bad!!”
While we were talking, the countdown to the new year had dropped below one minute.
Amagi-san quickly stood up, still holding my hand, and headed for the front door.
“W-where are we going!?”
“Outside! Jumping inside the room would bother the people downstairs, right!?”
Faced with such a perfectly reasonable argument, I silently put on my shoes.
It was hard to believe this was coming from someone who’d been talking loudly on the phone without a thought for me, their neighbor, but whatever…
“Only about ten seconds left!”
“It’s fine, it’s fine! Here we go!”
Still holding my hand, she bounded down the stairs two at a time.
Having rushed out without any winter clothes, the cold night wind stabbed straight into my body. But her hand was warm, and I desperately clung to it, refusing to let go.
“Come on, Saeki, jump!! Jump!!”
“Huh, here!?”
We hadn’t finished descending the stairs yet; about five steps remained.
Leaving me hesitating behind, she leapt first.
Her golden hair danced.
Each strand shimmered, wrapped in the night.
Her retreating figure was beautiful, and the glance she cast my way, beckoning me, was so lovely that I too flung my body into the winter sky.
It was the first time in my life I’d ever jumped down stairs like this.
Back in elementary school, a classmate would hop down the stairs, ignoring the teacher’s warnings, and told me to do it too. I was too scared to try. They made fun of me, and Subaru defended me.
Now, actually doing it, I still felt scared.
But just having her right there made my lips curve into a smile.
I felt like I could do anything.
I could take a step forward without reason, and feel just a little bit stronger.
“Whoops! Whoa!?”
Amagi-san failed her landing and lost her balance badly.
Landing a split second later, I pulled hard to help her up. But my own body tilted forward too, and we both toppled over together.
Lying on the ground, staring up at the sky, I checked the time on my phone.
The year had turned, and a new one had begun.
“Happy New Year, Amagi-san.”
“Happy New Year, Saeki!”
We stood up and brushed the dirt off our clothes, patting them off. A resident returning home on the first floor gave us a strange look, wondering what those two were up to. We gave a slight bow before laughing together with Amagi-san.
“Um… this year, could you please not jump off the stairs? It’s just incredibly dangerous.”
“Does that mean you’ll be with me again at the end of this year too?”
“If that’s what you want, Amagi-san… well…”
That was over three hundred days away.
There was no guarantee Amagi-san would still like me by then.
A faint unease dampened the edge of my heart, but in that instant, she threw herself into my arms with a thud. Her eyes, looking up at me, were shining, hot, and beautiful like fireworks.
“Love youu~~~♡♡♡ Not just this year, let’s be together forever and ever, okay?♡♡♡”
She grinned, revealing her white teeth.
I was so happy, and precisely because of that, I felt a little embarrassed and looked away. Then I looked at her again and nodded.
Our two puffs of white breath mingled, intertwined, and drifted away on the night breeze.
Without looking sideways, straight ahead.
Toward the direction of the rising sun.
Maiban